


Catching Cold

by Anonymous



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/M, Fever, Hand Jobs, Omorashi, Praise Kink, Pre-Canon, Sickfic, Urination
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-05
Updated: 2019-08-05
Packaged: 2020-08-09 22:54:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20125183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Caleb catches a cold. Nott takes care of him.





	Catching Cold

The day Caleb's fever starts, it's raining heavily and both he and Nott are caught unprepared. Their cloaks were probably waterproof at some point, but they don't keep out much rain these days, full of holes as they are. The rain is freezing cold, as is the wind that howls through the trees of the forest they've been hiding in. They've been huddled together against the trunk of one of the bigger trees, Nott curled up against Caleb's side with his arm around her shoulder. Their pants are cold and damp with mud, and their shirts are only slightly drier thanks to the cloaks.

Nott feels Caleb shiver against her, and she shakes off her own trembling at the cold. He doesn't stop, though, and when she looks up at him, she can see his face is flushed red and his half-lidded eyes are starting to go glassy.

"Hey," she whispers, tugging on his sleeve, "hey, Caleb, are you alright?"

He looks down at her, and she's not sure how much of the moisture on his face is rain and how much is sweat.

"I feel a little warm," he says, voice quiet and raspy.  
Nott reaches up, puts the back of her hand to his forehead, and hisses at how hot it is. It’s nearly painful, especially given how cold her hands are from the weather. She pulls it away quickly and wipes her hand off on her pants, trying to ignore how her heart is in her throat.

“Caleb, you’re burning up. I think you have a fever.” She can’t quite keep the worry out of her voice, though she does her best to mask it. They’re already in a shitty situation, and she’d like to keep Caleb as calm as possible. Her hands shake a little as she reaches for her flask, and she curses quietly when she feels how light it is. They haven’t been to a town in almost a week, and they’re nearly out of everything. Food, booze, money… Nott shakes her head, trying to clear it. Now is not the time to panic. She unscrews the lid of her flask, takes a swig of the whiskey, and sighs at the warm sting of alcohol in her throat. She shakes the flask a little before putting the cap back on. There’s maybe one or two more swallows of whiskey left in there. Hopefully it’ll be enough to stave off the worst parts of withdrawal until she can steal more. At the very least, it settles her nerves a bit, and her hands don’t tremble as much.

“We need to get you somewhere dry. Somewhere we can start a fire. Did you see any sort of rocky outcroppings, anything like that?”

Caleb shakes his head slowly, like it’s taking every ounce of energy he has to do so. His head tips back, resting on the tree behind him, and he makes a pitiful noise. Nott worries at her lip with her sharp, jagged teeth, thinking, and stands up.

“Listen, Caleb, I’m going to go look around, see if there’s anywhere in this forest we can get out of the rain. Just stay here and don’t do anything. Don’t go anywhere, don’t touch anything, just… stay here. Can you do that for me?”

Caleb nods, and he looks especially terrible from this angle. He was already gaunt and dirty, but now he’s flushed fever-red and he looks absent in his own mind. His eyes are unfocused and he’s breathing heavily, shaking just a little. Nott runs her fingers through his hair once, avoiding touching his scalp with her sharp claws, and makes eye contact with him.

“I’ll be back. I won’t leave you. I promise.”

His head lolls to the side as he stares at her. “Okay,” he says, and he sounds so weak and sad that it breaks Nott’s heart.

“I’ll be back,” she repeats as she pulls her hood up and turns to step out from under the tree. The rain is torrential and deafening without the cover of the leaves and branches. She looks around, trying to find anything that might serve as a makeshift shelter. When she doesn’t immediately see anything, she sighs, and turns to her left. She spends nearly 45 minutes winding her way through the trees before she finds exactly what she was looking for. There’s a huge stack of rocks with one of them jutting out just enough to act as a cover. She can even see the long-cooled remains of a campfire. They won’t be the first ones to spend an evening or two here. She goes back to get Caleb, finds him half-asleep exactly where she left him, and she does her best to help him up and support him as he stumbles.

The shelter itself is only a fifteen minute walk away from where they were, though with Caleb sick as he is, it takes them closer to half an hour. By the time they reach the stones, both of them are drenched to the bone and shaking cold. Nott helps ease him down, helps him crawl underneath the rock and strip out of his dripping wet coat.

“I’m going to start a fire so we can warm up and dry off. You just get as comfortable as you can.”  
Before she even finishes her sentence, Caleb is lying down on the ground, head on his folded-up coat like a pillow, and curling in on himself. Getting a fire started takes some time- it’s hard to find wood that isn’t green and isn’t too drenched to ignite, but Nott manages. She gets a small fire going, and strips out of everything but her bandages and smallclothes. She’s more exposed than she’d like, but Caleb is too out of it to remember any of this, and all things considered, she’s still pretty covered up. She lays her clothes out by the fire and turns her attention to Caleb.

He’s still flushed and hot to the touch, but he’s shivering and Nott decides that she needs to get the wet clothes off of him as soon as possible.  
“Hey, Caleb, I’m gonna undress you so your clothes can dry out. I don’t want you getting any sicker from lying there in wet pants.”

“How did you know?” He sounds pitiful, sad and raspy with his teeth chattering just a bit.

Nott furrows her brow. “Know what? How to take care of a sick person? I’ve had plenty of practice on that.”

“That I pissed myself,” Caleb says quietly, and Nott frowns. He’s curled in on himself, sick and miserable, and she just wants to take care of him, make him better. Do whatever it takes to protect him and get him back to full health because she needs him as much as he needs her.

“It’s okay,” she says, soothing, “it happens. I’ll get your pants and shirt off of you and they can dry out, and the rain will take care of the piss. Okay?”

“_Ja_,” Caleb says, and does his best to help her as she unbuttons his shirt and unlaces his pants, though his clumsy fingers only really get in her way. She lets him fumble, though, knows that he wants to feel useful and that this will satisfy that desire. Once he’s down to his own bandages and smallclothes, she lays his shirt next to hers and holds his pants outside for a few minutes before wringing them out and putting them by the fire.

“There,” she says, and smiles at him. “We’ll get our clothes dry and warm and in the meantime, I think I have a blanket that isn’t too soggy and a few biscuits left.”

Thankfully, her pack is more weatherproof than her cloak, and the one-person wool blanket folded up inside is dry enough. She drapes it over Caleb, then takes a moment to examine him. His skin is hot and he’s still sweating profusely, so she fishes his waterskin out and helps hold his head up so he can drink from it. She helps him eat two stale biscuits, gives him more water, and finally curls up next to him, her back to his stomach.

“Thank you, Nott,” he whispers, and drapes his arm over her. She squeezes his hand briefly.

“You’re welcome, Caleb.”

She sleeps well that night, better than she expected given the circumstances, but she’s woken up when Caleb starts to move behind her. It feels like he’s trying to sit up, and she turns to face him immediately. He’s propped up on his elbows, eyes squeezed shut, and his dirty, copper-brown hair is plastered to his forehead with sweat.

“What’s wrong?” Nott asks sharply, cold fear gathering in her gut.

“N-nothing,” Caleb says, voice shaky, and he tries to turn over so he can get on his knees. He moves painfully slowly, eyes still shut, and he breathes like he’s trying not to pass out.

“Caleb, what do you need?” She’s worried, worried that he’s getting worse or hallucinating or trying to run, and he’ll never make it out there alone, especially like this, half-naked and so sick he can barely sit up. “If there’s something you want, I’ll get it for you, don’t exert yourself-“

“It’s, ah- I’m- I have to-“ He’s not looking at her, eyes still shut, and now the low, flickering firelight seems to almost illuminate a blush that looks like embarrassment. Nott reaches out, runs her calloused hand down his back in what she hopes is a comforting gesture.

"I have to piss, but I don't think I can- can stand up, _Scheiße-_" 

"Oh." Nott feels relief wash over her, she was so worried but this is nothing, this is fine, Caleb is _fine_ and this she can help with. He's on his knees, slumped forward with his elbows on the ground, and one of his hands pressed between his legs. She kneels next to him, and puts her hand on his lower back.

"Do you think you can crawl forward just a little bit, Caleb? Just a few feet, and I'll help you, okay?"

Caleb nods, and with Nott's help he slowly shuffles on his knees towards the edge of the outcropping. He has to stop several times, whimpering and clenching his legs together, but he makes it close enough that Nott feels like she can work with this. They're close enough to the outside that the wet grass brushes against Caleb's knees, and his upper thighs are getting wet with rain dripping from the edge of the rock overhead. He whines at the feeling of water on his skin.

"Nott, _bitte, ich will mich nicht nochmal anpissen-_"

"Shh, shh, it's okay, Caleb, I've got you. Here," Nott moves so she's knelt behind him, and she reaches her arm around his waist. He's so thin that she barely has trouble reaching into his smallclothes and pulling his cock free, despite how short her goblin arms are. He makes a pathetic little noise at the feel of her cold hand on his skin, and she can feel him trembling.

"_Bitte,_" he whispers, and Nott uses her free hand to rub comforting circles on his lower back.

"It's okay," she says softly, "you're okay, Caleb, I've got you. Just let go."

"I- I can't-"

"You can. You can do it, okay? I know you can." She thinks for a minute, thinks what she knows about the man in front of her, and murmurs, "I know you want to be good for me. I know you _can_ be good for me. Relax and let go for me, okay?"

Caleb makes a noise that Nott can only pretend is something other than a moan, and she just barely feels him twitch in her hand. It's another minute or so before he finally breathes out a deep sigh and starts to relieve himself. Nott helps him aim his steam into the grass outside of the rock outcropping, and it's so heavy that she can hear the splashing of piss on grass even over the still-pounding rain. Caleb is breathing heavily and whining quietly, and it feels like entire minutes go by until his stream finally starts to weaken. He finishes, and Nott shakes his dick gently to get the last drops of moisture off. 

Then she freezes, because she realizes that Caleb is half-hard in her hand as he's slumped forward and trying to catch his breath. Her first impulse is to pull her hand away, to help him back to bed and pretend like she didn't notice, but something inside of her balks at the idea. She wants to… to touch him, to bring him off, to make him feel... if not _good,_ then at least _better._ She can tell exactly how shitty he's feeling, and she wants to help.

And a weird, feral part of her goblin brain wants him to know he's _hers_. It's- weird, it's a feeling, an _urge,_ that she's not used to, and she doesn't fully understand it, but it's some primal goblin desire to show what an ideal partner she is, both to him and to everyone else. She's not sure where the thought even came from, they haven't done anything beyond cuddling since they met, and Caleb has never struck her as being quite _her type,_ but-

"Caleb," she says, "you did so good for me. Such a good boy. Do you feel better?"

She can feel his cock swelling in her hand, and she hears the hitch in his breath at the praise. The rain continues to fall outside, but she can barely hear it over the thudding of her heartbeat in her ears. Caleb nods silently, and jerks as Nott shifts behind him and her hand moves just a little.

"Caleb," she says again, and she should stop, she should shut up and go back to sleep before she ruins the one good thing in her life, "would you like me to jerk you off?"

He inhales sharply, and she feels his body tense in front of hers even though she can also feel him getting harder.

"_Ja,_" he says, and his voice is hoarse.

"Are you sure?" A terrible thought flashes through Nott's mind, and she freezes. "Will you regret saying yes when you're well again?"

"I don't know," Caleb says, "I do not think I will. But right now I would like to come, and if you are offering…"

Nott bites her lip. She wants to, _oh,_ she wants to, and there's every chance he won't even remember the next morning and she feels a little dirty, like she's taking advantage of him, but-

"I do want to get you off, Caleb, but only if you're sure you want that. From me."

Slowly, shakily, Caleb rocks his hips up, thrusting his cock into Nott's hand. "Please," he breathes, and that's all the encouragement Nott needs. He whines when she takes her hand away to spit in it, but hisses as she wraps it around him again, now slick and warm.

Nott brings him to full hardness, which doesn't take long at all. She has him whining and whimpering as she twists her wrist and changes up her rhythm every few strokes. She slows to give special attention to the head, to thumb at his slit, to gather some of the precum starting to bead at the top to help slick his cock. The noises he makes are so pretty, and that weird, possessive part of her gets a rush knowing that those are _her_ noises, _she's_ the one who's making him sound like that, and she's the only one around who gets to hear them.

"Such a good boy for me, yes, you're doing so well, so hard and hot and needy for me. You're being so good, Caleb, so good. Are you close?"

Caleb nods wordlessly, and Nott speeds up the movement of her hand. With the other, she rests her hand on his stomach, just holding him close to her.

"Can you come for me, Caleb? Be a good boy and come."

And he does, spilling into her hand with a ragged gasp. She feels his dick pulsing as hot cum spatters onto her palm and wrist, and Caleb nearly collapses forward before Nott catches him.

"Woah! Easy there, you're okay, you're good, just… Breathe. Catch your breath. Then we'll go back to bed."

Caleb shakes his head slowly. "You didn't come." 

"I didn't want to." It's not a lie, per se, she really doesn't want to be touched or seen any more than she already has, and besides. This was altruistic. She did it for him. "Look, let's get you back to bed."

Nott tears off a piece from one of her bandages and uses it to wipe Caleb as clean as possible before she helps him back to where they had been sleeping. He's still feverish and sweaty, but he seems a bit more calm. When he's settled in and covered with the blanket again, Nott takes a moment to watch him before wriggling in next to him again. He pulls her close and presses what feels suspiciously like a kiss to the back of her head. Then he falls asleep, and she's not long after. Outside, the rain continues to fall.

**Author's Note:**

> yeah idk either


End file.
